HTC Vive Owners Thread

[MavericK]

I think the only extras you get are two extra face cushions, right?

Now I just need to convince my boss that we need this at the office...

 

[zeroyon04]

I've had my Vive since launch, and have 61 VR games for it on Steam now already.... I seem to be spending most of my time in Rec Room and Battle Dome though.

Also, I just purchased an EVGA GTX 1080 today. My current rig uses a GTX 980, and after trying out supersampling at 1.5~1.7.... it looks SOOO much better, but I can't get anywhere near 90fps, even with my 980 overclocked. Hopefully it gets here soon, because once it does I'm supersampling everything!

 

[Swolern]

I've had my Vive since launch, and have 61 VR games for it on Steam now already.... I seem to be spending most of my time in Rec Room and Battle Dome though.

Also, I just purchased an EVGA GTX 1080 today. My current rig uses a GTX 980, and after trying out supersampling at 1.5~1.7.... it looks SOOO much better, but I can't get anywhere near 90fps, even with my 980 overclocked. Hopefully it gets here soon, because once it does I'm supersampling everything!

Nice upgrade indeed! Even better when Nvidia fully capitalizes on the Pascal VR optimizations as promised. You should be able to get 2.0 Supersampling on the 1080 OC on many Vive games.

 

[noko]

Nice upgrade indeed! Even better when Nvidia fully capitalizes on the Pascal VR optimizations as promised. You should be able to get 2.0 Supersampling on the 1080 OC on many Vive games.

I would like to see the new Titan X results in VR. Maybe worth the extra bucks there.

 

[FrgMstr]

I would like to see the new Titan X results in VR. Maybe worth the extra bucks there.

That will be happening soon.

 

[noko]

Awesome!

 

[Dodogif]

I set mine up yesterday and it's mind-blowing. Worth every penny. It's a no-brainer if you have the rig, money, and floor space.

Totally agree with you! After using google cardboard I find HTC Vive just extraordinary

 

[MavericK]

I want to pull the trigger on a Vive so bad...I just wonder if the Touch controllers will add any sort of competition for the Rift.

 

[grifter_66]

I want to pull the trigger on a Vive so bad...I just wonder if the Touch controllers will add any sort of competition for the Rift.

They will, everyone I have talked to who have had the chance to use the Touch controllers said that touch was superior to the Vive's controllers and better suited to both roomscale and more traditional control methods at the same time. Now, that being said, the Vive's roomscale sensors are still much better than the Oculus sensors and will allow for a bigger roomscale experience with less hardware. While you can mimick that for the most part with the Oculus sensors you'd need four of those sensors wired to your PC via USB 3, not something that will be easily doable for most people. I think the real question in the coming months will be "What will developers support?" Will we see more roomscale games designed with the Vive in mind or will we see games targeted at smaller roomscale experiences to incorporate both Oculus and Vive. My money is on the latter.

 

[MavericK]

That's a good point. Really the only thing I don't like about the Vive is the small focal point of the Fresnel lenses, which I have heard is better on the Rift. But the strengths of the Vive may outweigh that overall. Compatibility and support is a big one, like you said.

 

[Johnny78]

I keep the supersampling at 1.5 as that seems to be the sweet spot that my rig can handle across the board. I can use 2.0 on some games but others (like Raw Data) it creates too much judder.

I'm tempted to pick up a 1080 but fuck I haven't even had my current rig that long and I'm pretty confident that if they could just get SLI working on VR I could avoid upgrading for a little while. Currently using a 4790K @ 4.5, 32 gigs and 2 OC 980TIs.

But yeah, for those of you who have cracked up the supersampling on the VIVE, I'm sure you can agree it looks pretty damn amazing.

 

[Swolern]

I keep the supersampling at 1.5 as that seems to be the sweet spot that my rig can handle across the board. I can use 2.0 on some games but others (like Raw Data) it creates too much judder.

I'm tempted to pick up a 1080 but fuck I haven't even had my current rig that long and I'm pretty confident that if they could just get SLI working on VR I could avoid upgrading for a little while. Currently using a 4790K @ 4.5, 32 gigs and 2 OC 980TIs.

But yeah, for those of you who have cracked up the supersampling on the VIVE, I'm sure you can agree it looks pretty damn amazing.

For me x2.0 is where you can see the most difference on the Vive. I'm waiting for SLI support 2 with 1070 SLI.

 

[FrgMstr]

I'm waiting for SLI support 2 with 1070 SLI.

Currently this looks like it will be game by game till it can get baked into UE4/Unity, and until then I do not think you will see much mGPU adoption.

 

[Chaos Machine]

im probably going to wait for a 1080ti and dump my 980tis in SLI, I have been really disappointed with VR SLI thusfar.

 

[grifter_66]

If we get to a point where each card can power an individual display independent of the other then I'll grab a second but as long as you have to run the cards in SLI/Crossfire mode I'll stick with a single card solution.

 

[Swolern]

If we get to a point where each card can power an individual display independent of the other then I'll grab a second but as long as you have to run the cards in SLI/Crossfire mode I'll stick with a single card solution.

That is what VR-SLI as stated to do by Nvidia. Each GPU runs one VR screen(eye). There are only a couple VR-SLI demos out right now and I don't think anyone has tested them to see if this was indeed the case. I did run VR-SLI in the Funhouse demo( which does support VR-SLI and I was getting different GPU % use from each GPU, I think it was 70/30% so it doesn't look like it was working right.

 

[MavericK]

I think someone else mentioned that in the nVidia Funhouse, PhysX is rendered on the second GPU if SLI is present.

 

[grifter_66]

That is what VR-SLI as stated to do by Nvidia. Each GPU runs one VR screen(eye). There are only a couple VR-SLI demos out right now and I don't think anyone has tested them to see if this was indeed the case. I did run VR-SLI in the Funhouse demo( which does support VR-SLI and I was getting different GPU % use from each GPU, I think it was 70/30% so it doesn't look like it was working right.

I think someone else mentioned that in the nVidia Funhouse, PhysX is rendered on the second GPU if SLI is present.

Yeah, from what I understand you actually need TRI-SLI in order to take advantage of two cards for rendering as the second card in an SLI setup is always used for physics in the VR Funhouse demos.

 

[pj-]

Won't single pass stereo make SLI much less attractive for VR? According to valve a second GPU only gives you 30-35% extra performance, and that's with traditional sequential rendering on the solo GPU. Gains from single pass will probably erase most if not all of the speed increase of a second GPU.

 

[Swolern]

Yeah, from what I understand you actually need TRI-SLI in order to take advantage of two cards for rendering as the second card in an SLI setup is always used for physics in the VR Funhouse demos.

Ya lets get 3 way SLI to get one demo working. LOL. Not!

I mainly have 1070 SLI mainly for my 3440x1440 100hz monitor. VR-SLI would have been nice for every game to have 2.0-3.0 Supersampling, but oh well.

 

[MavericK]

Whelp, I pulled the trigger...Vive incoming, should be here mid next week.

 

[MavericK]

Btw, as a heads up to anyone buying from Newegg, the free game promo apparently went "out of stock" when I ordered because it never showed up on my order. I contacted support and they said they would send me one once they receive more keys, but if you are just now buying I would probably wait until it's back in stock just to make sure.

EDIT: Apparently the current promo has changed to a new set of games: Tilt Brush, Zombie Simulator and The Gallery.

 

[Swolern]

Congrats! And wow that is a much better group of free games IMO!!

 

[LurkerLito]

Just bought mine today at microcenter and got the new bundle.


First impressions were great. I love the thing and I didn't even get to try the included games yet. No motion sickness at all which is something I was thinking I might get cause I am pretty bad with it. I ran into an issue though. I am perfectly fine without my glasses on real close objects for reading like with a kindle or a book, but the vive is just not close enough so everything is slightly blurry without the glasses. I put in my old prescription glasses and used the vive with them on and everything was perfect. But the frames really don't work well with the vive and contacts are out of the question as I hate them. Weird thing is if I pop up the desktop or the steam interface it's all a bit blurry without the glasses but the screen door effect isn't nearly as prominent, with the glasses I can clearly read the steam interface but the screen door effect is pretty apparent on the high contrast areas like white text.

Though my room is a bit small for full VR and I fudged the measurements a bit and it is so great when I tried it with the tutorial. It kept complaining my room was too small, so I just sort of moved the controller over the couch a couple of inches and I was set. I have to some moving of stuff, throwing away of junk, and rearranging but I might just barely have enough room for it.

Setup though...wow what a pain lol. Holy look at all those wires . The headset being wired I guess is kind of essential but man it gets in the way. I think I am going to trip over that eventually.

 

[MavericK]

I got my Vive yesterday (one day early!) and set it up in a small room temporarily. Bought some light stands and ball mounts which seem to work great.

Having some minor tracking issues but I'm not sure what the cause is...is there any sort of utility to see what is going on with tracking to try and pinpoint what the issue might be?

Otherwise, awesome piece of kit, already have used it before so no "WOW" moments. No dead pixels or issues with the lenses or anything, everything looks pristine. Still not sure how to get my eye distance correct other than going to an optometrist.

Newegg is still dicking me around on the games promo so I don't have those yet, but I do have Raw Data and H3VR, as well as plenty free items. I'm bummed that I didn't have the Vive when Steam did that VR sale a month or two ago, there are several titles I want to pick up but some I might wait for a sale.

 

[FrgMstr]

Zennioptical.com has a pupillary distance tool.

 

[LurkerLito]

I'm bummed that I didn't have the Vive when Steam did that VR sale a month or two ago, there are several titles I want to pick up but some I might wait for a sale.

I have to agree there. I would have probably bought a few games like Raw Data, but I will just wait for them now to go on sale. I only bought one thing the Simple Video player for the Vive. And it's actually quite good, but unfortunately I don't think I'll ever just use a vive to watch stuff because honestly the picture is worse than my monitor. I can easily see the screen door effect with video. It's hard to ignore it like I can with games. As far as 3D goes, the 360 VR stuff is OK but not really that great IMHO, the SBS stereoscopic when done right looks better to me but for the most part it looks the same as the regular video except in certain parts and I wouldn't consider it one of those must have things on a movie. Though the really cool thing is you can stretch the screen to be gigantic with or without a curve it has some really nice options and I would still recommend getting it. I downloaded a lot of videos SBS and 360 ones from youtube using the video downloadhelper plugin for firefox.

Right now I LOVE the Lab. It was free and I think it's archery area is the best. It blows away anything archery I have played with the PS3 Move. I was very immersed in the game. Project cars was great. I hope Assetto Corsa puts in a VR mode because I like that game more than Project Cars (and have most of the DLC there ). Starseed is quite nice, It looks and plays great for the short time I played it. Unfortunately I sort of strained my back so a lot of the VR stuff that might require bending down is out for now. The Zombie game is OK, but it feels like a tech demo and kind of gets old fast. But so far, the thing that blew my mind away was DCS World. It's the first one that truly made me feel like I was in a real Airplane (even down to the slight sick feeling I get in planes). I didn't dig out my old Cougar Hotas but just used a controller but just WOW. Since DCS planes all have a 3d cockpit it was like being in a plane. You can lean forward push, pull and interact will all the buttons, switches and levers inside. As I moved forward all the MFDs were crystal clear. The only real issue was I felt a little sick as I flew and turned the plane while looking out the canopy. It was very immersive. I recommend checking it out as DCSWorld is free and there are like two planes you can get free and fly around with at DCS. Also be warned it requires a pretty beefy GPU. I saw stuttering with my usual settings on my 980Ti. It seems every time I try a flight sim even my best equipment still isn't enough to play at max settings. I might be OK on the normal monitor at 1600p at around 40ish FPS, but now with the Vive my machine is now not good enough again lol. BTW the controller sucks for this game you really need some kind of joystick. I was over correcting like mad and that might have made the slight motion sickness feeling worse. Flying straight and looking around was fine, but banking and spinning was making me feel it.

 

[MavericK]

Also, I believe my tracking issues are probably related to windows in the room. Mirrors can also cause problems, so make sure the blinds are down / mirrors are covered in your VR room.

 

[Swolern]

I have to agree there. I would have probably bought a few games like Raw Data, but I will just wait for them now to go on sale. I only bought one thing the Simple Video player for the Vive. And it's actually quite good, but unfortunately I don't think I'll ever just use a vive to watch stuff because honestly the picture is worse than my monitor. I can easily see the screen door effect with video. It's hard to ignore it like I can with games. As far as 3D goes, the 360 VR stuff is OK but not really that great IMHO, the SBS stereoscopic when done right looks better to me but for the most part it looks the same as the regular video except in certain parts and I wouldn't consider it one of those must have things on a movie. Though the really cool thing is you can stretch the screen to be gigantic with or without a curve it has some really nice options and I would still recommend getting it. I downloaded a lot of videos SBS and 360 ones from youtube using the video downloadhelper plugin for firefox.

Right now I LOVE the Lab. It was free and I think it's archery area is the best. It blows away anything archery I have played with the PS3 Move. I was very immersed in the game. Project cars was great. I hope Assetto Corsa puts in a VR mode because I like that game more than Project Cars (and have most of the DLC there ). Starseed is quite nice, It looks and plays great for the short time I played it. Unfortunately I sort of strained my back so a lot of the VR stuff that might require bending down is out for now. The Zombie game is OK, but it feels like a tech demo and kind of gets old fast. But so far, the thing that blew my mind away was DCS World. It's the first one that truly made me feel like I was in a real Airplane (even down to the slight sick feeling I get in planes). I didn't dig out my old Cougar Hotas but just used a controller but just WOW. Since DCS planes all have a 3d cockpit it was like being in a plane. You can lean forward push, pull and interact will all the buttons, switches and levers inside. As I moved forward all the MFDs were crystal clear. The only real issue was I felt a little sick as I flew and turned the plane while looking out the canopy. It was very immersive. I recommend checking it out as DCSWorld is free and there are like two planes you can get free and fly around with at DCS. Also be warned it requires a pretty beefy GPU. I saw stuttering with my usual settings on my 980Ti. It seems every time I try a flight sim even my best equipment still isn't enough to play at max settings. I might be OK on the normal monitor at 1600p at around 40ish FPS, but now with the Vive my machine is now not good enough again lol. BTW the controller sucks for this game you really need some kind of joystick. I was over correcting like mad and that might have made the slight motion sickness feeling worse. Flying straight and looking around was fine, but banking and spinning was making me feel it.

Man DCS World sounds awesome!! I'm going to have to try it out. Thanks man.

 

[MavericK]

Small update - finally got Newegg email support to send me the new games bundle. Looks like it's properly showing up as being a combo with the Vive now on their site.

 

[Swolern]

Anyone that is having tracking problems, I was having problem for months. Finally figured out it was my TV interfering with the RF signal in the Lighthouse sensors. Zero problems after that.

 

[MavericK]

I got my setup pretty good right now, very little tracking issues.

I recommend picking up Out of Ammo...very fun game, can play co-op as well.

 

[Dayaks]

I am 99% sure I want to get one of these for Christmas for my five and eight year old. I might trial it in Philadelphia before then while I am down there for work.

Any suggestions? Must have accessories? Ect?

Ways to avoid the wife murdering me....?

Debating if I want to drill into my walls to run the tower wires. Seems like an easy yes.

 

[MavericK]

I am 99% sure I want to get one of these for Christmas for my five and eight year old. I might trial it in Philadelphia before then while I am down there for work.

Any suggestions? Must have accessories? Ect?

Ways to avoid the wife murdering me....?

Debating if I want to drill into my walls to run the tower wires. Seems like an easy yes.

First, please for the love of god DO NOT let your kids play any MP games if they are going to run around and scream loudly into the mic. That is a big problem right now in Rec Room.

With that said, here are my recommends based on experience:

1) For accessories, I would definitely get a different set of earbuds, or use headphones. The stock ones suck.

I also would recommend getting more foam face pads, either through HTC or via another source like VRCovers. I just got a set of the 6mm VRCovers ones in and I like them a lot. They are much thinner than the stock ones, so you are able to get your eyes closer to the lenses which increases FOV substantially. Of course, those are not so good for people who wear glasses (Pro-tip: be careful with glasses - they can scratch your Vive lenses). I would use the stock ones and see how they feel to you. You can order OEM replacements through HTC if you like the stock foam. You get two of different widths with the Vive, but it's nice to have extra because they tend to get damp with sweat.

I have heard of some folks buying something like this for the controllers - I might try something like that but I have mild concerns about being able to get the plug piece out of the recessed Vive controller plug. Would definitely be convenient, though.

I also did a mod for the headpiece to use a welding helmet mount instead of the included elastic stuff - it essentially looks like this. I bought the 3D printed adapter parts and it seems to work well, EXCEPT it is hard to wear large headphones with it due to those black knobs. Just something to keep in mind if you go that route (I just ended up buying better earbuds).

2) Can't help you with the wife murder, although mine was alright with it because she likes VR as well and it all came out of my own money, so...

3) If you don't want to drill holes and/or you want it to be portable, I recommend buying a set of light stands with ball-joint mounts. I got these and these and they seem to work well. But you will probably get the most stable experience with the wall mounts - the Vive lighthouses have motors that vibrate and depending on how stable the stands you get are, it can cause some micro-jitter in the tracking. I will probably end up mounting them to the wall but I wanted to test them in different rooms and see what I liked best. Also, it gives you the option of going mobile with it in the future.

Hope that was helpful. Definitely give it a try if you can and make sure you like it - however, I don't think I've had anyone not think it was awesome after demoing it.

 

[FrgMstr]

First, please for the love of god DO NOT let your kids play any MP games if they are going to run around and scream loudly into the mic. That is a big problem right now in Rec Room.

With that said, here are my recommends based on experience:

1) For accessories, I would definitely get a different set of earbuds, or use headphones. The stock ones suck.

I also would recommend getting more foam face pads, either through HTC or via another source like VRCovers. I just got a set of the 6mm VRCovers ones in and I like them a lot. They are much thinner than the stock ones, so you are able to get your eyes closer to the lenses which increases FOV substantially. Of course, those are not so good for people who wear glasses (Pro-tip: be careful with glasses - they can scratch your Vive lenses). I would use the stock ones and see how they feel to you. You can order OEM replacements through HTC if you like the stock foam. You get two of different widths with the Vive, but it's nice to have extra because they tend to get damp with sweat.

I have heard of some folks buying something like this for the controllers - I might try something like that but I have mild concerns about being able to get the plug piece out of the recessed Vive controller plug. Would definitely be convenient, though.

I also did a mod for the headpiece to use a welding helmet mount instead of the included elastic stuff - it essentially looks like this. I bought the 3D printed adapter parts and it seems to work well, EXCEPT it is hard to wear large headphones with it due to those black knobs. Just something to keep in mind if you go that route (I just ended up buying better earbuds).

2) Can't help you with the wife murder, although mine was alright with it because she likes VR as well and it all came out of my own money, so...

3) If you don't want to drill holes and/or you want it to be portable, I recommend buying a set of light stands with ball-joint mounts. I got these and these and they seem to work well. But you will probably get the most stable experience with the wall mounts - the Vive lighthouses have motors that vibrate and depending on how stable the stands you get are, it can cause some micro-jitter in the tracking. I will probably end up mounting them to the wall but I wanted to test them in different rooms and see what I liked best. Also, it gives you the option of going mobile with it in the future.

Hope that was helpful. Definitely give it a try if you can and make sure you like it - however, I don't think I've had anyone not think it was awesome after demoing it.

Great stuff MavericK !

 

[Swolern]

I am 99% sure I want to get one of these for Christmas for my five and eight year old. I might trial it in Philadelphia before then while I am down there for work.

Any suggestions? Must have accessories? Ect?

Ways to avoid the wife murdering me....?

Debating if I want to drill into my walls to run the tower wires. Seems like an easy yes.

The 2 base sensor units only need a power source so as long as you are close to an outlet you are good. I got lucky and had an outlet in my attic right above the corner of my living room. So you see no wires with my sensors. They communicate with the HMD/PC wirelessly.

 

[LurkerLito]

Or you can do what I did and use 2 of these in the corners of your room : 2-in-1 Support/Cargo Bar and get 2 of these: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00E5M39AW/ to mount the base stations with. They are rock solid stable but they are blue so your wife might object even if they are in the corner of the room. But it makes it easy to remove if you have guests and redo your setup. I put in the Harbor Freight links because they are the least expensive ones at $15 each, Amazon also has them but they are more money and red or yellow only.

 

[Dayaks]

Wow I just tried it and it way surpassed what I expected. The MS store had both sensors on the ceiling on the same wall. Definitely buying it for Christmas.

Thanks for all the tips!

 

[MavericK]

The 2 base sensor units only need a power source so as long as you are close to an outlet you are good. I got lucky and had an outlet in my attic right above the corner of my living room. So you see no wires with my sensors. They communicate with the HMD/PC wirelessly.

Looks like you need to wipe off that lighthouse...fingerprints all up on it.

 

[Cr4ckm0nk3y]

Also be warned it requires a pretty beefy GPU. I saw stuttering with my usual settings on my 980Ti. It seems every time I try a flight sim even my best equipment still isn't enough to play at max settings. I might be OK on the normal monitor at 1600p at around 40ish FPS, but now with the Vive my machine is now not good enough again lol. BTW the controller sucks for this game you really need some kind of joystick. I was over correcting like mad and that might have made the slight motion sickness feeling worse. Flying straight and looking around was fine, but banking and spinning was making me feel it.

Check out the settings people are using on the DCS forums. I dropped most settings to low except textures which are at medium. Flat or no shadows are a must.

I also found changing the pixel density to 1.5 - 2 makes a night and day difference in DCS. The PD option found in the in game VR settings only works on OR. Apparently the VIVE needs the config for SteamVR changed.

How to Sharpen HTC Vive Visuals with Supersampling - Road to VR

Be warned it changes PD globally. Changing the PD makes everything clearer and easier to read in DCS. The HUD is now 100% legible.

I can run DCS at 90 for the most part with a 980ti at PD of 1.5 with drops to 45 over the city or during heavy combat but no more nausea or eye strain.